Proposed rules: safer food or criminalizing charity?

By Chris Moran and Safiya Ravat

Updated 9:20 pm, Tuesday, March 6, 2012

Photo: Michael Paulsen

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Michael Gothann, left, Donald Johnson and Herman Bee, right, take advantage of Tuesday's sunshine to play some dominoes at Bute Park. "The people sitting at City Hall don't know what it's like out here," said Bee. less

Michael Gothann, left, Donald Johnson and Herman Bee, right, take advantage of Tuesday's sunshine to play some dominoes at Bute Park. "The people sitting at City Hall don't know what it's like out here," said ... more

Photo: Michael Paulsen

Proposed rules: safer food or criminalizing charity?

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Proposed regulations on feeding the homeless headed to City Council today come freighted with a polarized debate over whether the government is trying to get safer food to more people or just criminalizing charity.

Mayor Annise Parker is asking the council to adopt rules that would require organizations and people who feed the homeless to register with the city, take a food safety class, prepare the food in certified kitchens, serve only at three public parks, and leave those parks as clean as when they entered them.

Parker described her vision as one in which charities can coordinate their efforts through the city registry to reduce redundancy and waste.

"We're trying to do this in a way that we don't waste food so that churches, for example, don't show up on top of each other trying to feed the same group of 20 guys," Parker said during two hours of public testimony Tuesday.

Civil rights lawyer Randall Kallinen called the proposed rules an "assault on freedom of religion, freedom of expression and freedom of speech." The ordinance's penalties of $50 to $2,000 could make it a crime to feed the homeless, Kallinen said.

Councilwoman Helena Brown agreed and praised the speakers from groups who serve meals on the streets, telling them she hoped they'll "have the freedom to do that and you don't have to stop and say, 'Wait a minute, I have to go visit City Hall first.' "

The largest local institutions that serve homeless people, such as Star of Hope, SEARCH Homeless Services and The Beacon, support the new rules and already comply with proposals to operate out of city-approved kitchens and to serve meals within four hours of their preparation.

At some smaller operations, such as Strait & Narrow Way Temple Full Gospel Church at Fondren and Main, the rules are viewed as excessively burdensome.

"It's kind of strange and ironic that they want to stop help. We have actually been called to do this, to help those in need," said Edward J. Sweet Sr., Strait & Narrow's bishop. "It's kind of sad that they would want to stop different organizations who are trying to make a change."

There are homeless people all over Houston, Sweet said, "so for the city to designate it to just those three parks makes it hard. How will these homeless people get to these three parks without transportation? How will the people in southwest Houston receive all the goods that we intended to donate to them?"

Some 13,000 on street

If adopted, the feeding rules would mark the third time in nine months that the council has acted to contain the city's homelessness problem, which by some estimates has 13,000 people living on the street. Last July, the council expanded the area where it is illegal to sleep on the sidewalk per the city's so-called civility ordinance. The next month, the council forbade panhandlers from coming within eight feet of patio diners.

Parker said in her inaugural address in January that making progress on homelessness would be a priority of her second term. Her administration pitched the rule changes as a way to protect the homeless from food poisoning and allergies, although opponents insist there is no evidence to suggest any health threat from donated food.

"Most everything they bring out here is fresh," said Herman Bee at Bute Park near downtown, where he regularly receives charity meals. "They should really …come out here and talk to us and ask our opinion."

Michael Gothann, who also lives on the street near Bute Park, said it would be hard to haul his belongings to the proposed feeding sites. "Why break something that's not broken?" he asked.

'Hit-or-miss' cleanup

Councilman James Rod­riguez, who represents downtown, said the rule changes would make charity more efficient and coordinated. He said downtown residents complain of persistent litter, defecation and fights that require police intervention and detract from the quality of life and make homes harder to sell.

Lack of regulations "sometimes results in food being improperly prepared and served and somewhat hit-or-miss cleanup," said Bob Eury, executive director of the Downtown District. "There would appear to be sufficient food availability in our community, but we don't have coordinated schedules, which means too much or too little food on a given day."